[olug] Interactive shell cluster

[Obi-Wan]

> I'm taking a shot in the dark here, does anyone know how to configure an
> interactive shell cluster?  
> 
> What I have is about 8 1U servers with 4CPUs each.  One acts as a
> headnode, the others as 'workers' (standard HPC cluster with PBS and
> Condor available for scheduling).  What I'd like is for anyone logging
> into the headnode to spawn a shell on a worker so that interactive CPU
> usage can be balanced.  I'd settle for round robin scheduling, it
> doesn't have to be 'smart' about it.

Sounds like you're looking for the Linux Virtual Server (LVS) project.
It does exactly what you're looking for by spreading out the number
of connections among a collection of "real servers".  It'll handle any
service you want, not just shells.  You can even have redundant head
nodes (called "directors" in LVS-speak) for high availability.

http://www.linuxvirtualserver.org/

-- 
Ben "Obi-Wan" Hollingsworth                             obiwan at jedi.com
   The stuff of earth competes for the allegiance I owe only to the
     Giver of all good things, so if I stand, let me stand on the
       promise that You will pull me through.  -- Rich Mullins